1-2 AK on AAsQ5s
Holiday time at Foxwoods on a Thursday night "boxing day" (day after xmas)
Might be another easy one. Hint: Folding did not occur to me at any point 😉.
V1 massive fish, was limp/calling super wide preflop for a long time and calling any pair/draw and raising sometimes. Was running hot and up. Also cold called a 3bet to 150 with 22 in MP, and the original raise folded TT but 22 held vs. AK. But then recently punted almost all of his stack by raising flop and firing turn+river and saying T high on Q6653 vs. KQ, and then pretty soon after limp/shoved AA for ~140 in pre. vs. H with AKo who 3bet to 52 after someone raised V1's limp. ~300
V2 ~40 white guy recently moved from a broken table, no real reads but seems generic 1-2 random. ~350-400
V3 ~25 female player, seems to be way above average for 1-2 ... H was playing with her boyfriend/husband/partner at 2-5, but I don't think they've spoken. H has 3bet V3 a bunch, mostly because she's been unlucky and also isn't overlimping much.
V4 generic 1-2 bad reg. white guy, been limp/calling wide pre. and mostly value heavy post. Preflop raises are good hands. Won a giant pot when he shoved JJ preflop for ~300bb and got snap called by AA but hit the J on the flop.
H Been at the table 4 hours or so, and moved from 2-5 when that kind of broke ... but not sure either V1 or V2 know that other than H is tight and mostly raises good hands. Covers table.
This is probably less than 5 hands after H doubled up V1 with AKo vs AA.
9 handed, 1-2
V1 limps EP (no shocks given)
one fold
V2 limps next to act
V3 raises to 10 next to act (LJ)
V4 calls next to act (HJ)
one fold
H sees AKo on the BTN, laughs to himself and makes it $42.
blinds fold
V1 calls
V2 calls
V3 folds
V4 folds
Three ways to a flop:
Pot: ~149 - rake
Flop: AAQr
V1 checks
V2 checks
H thinks about it (quickly) and checks assuming there's a great chance V1 will fire at the turn
Pot: ~149 - rake
Turn: A♠AQ5♠
V1 bets $100
V2 thinks a bit, and looks unhappy, or maybe unconvinced V1 has anything, and calls
H ??? (pot is now ~$350 and V1 has ~150 behind and V2 has ~200-250 behind) -- no spade
11 Replies
shove turn.
If we call we're obviously getting the money in on the river even if it completes a draw, so the question is what gets us the most.
In this situations it's really hard to even range people well let alone work out the most positive EV line in real time.
My default in these situations is just to get it in sooner, especially with less than an effective PSB. Shove.
I'm also going bigger pre against a bunch of randos and fish. Probably 50-60.
Just shove now -- they still have hope for another card so are more likely to call w/ worse than AK.
What do people think about a 20-25% pot bet on the flop? Against a fish and an unknown I think I prefer it to trying to force the issue on the turn.
As played turn action is great, now shove, you're getting called by an Ace and you've already got the extra money from whoever doesn't have the Ace. Not enough stack depth to get tricky with anything else, and you could still get called by KJ etc
I think small bet OTF has to be good, right? Checking this board as the PF 3bettor and then "waking up" on a future street looks insanely strong, although I guess V1 (and perhaps V2, who has willingly created a horrific spot for himself) may not comprehend that.
All that being said, this would appear to have worked out swimmingly and I think I would shove here. If someone finds a fold with JTss or QXss I don't even mind it, as there is so much dead money in the pot. I don't think either of these guys is folding any AX hand.
Also curious for OP's take on Foxwoods vs Mohegan Sun vs MGM Springfield, but don't want to derail the thread too much... Maybe we're just playing at Foxwoods so we can return a Christmas gift at the outlets beforehand.
This hand reminds me a lot of a very similar hand I played, wherein I made trip aces in a multi-way pot, faced aggressive action from two opponents after I slow-played my hand, and ended up losing to a boat (A5).
This hand is a little different, in that you're only facing aggression from a single opponent. Someone's chasing a draw or bluffing here. We'll usually have the best hand with AK, so obviously we can't fold, but I might proceed cautiously, just because we don't know much about V2.
If we knew more about V2, we might be able to determine if he's calling with a draw, or a worse ace, or if he might be Hollywooding with a slow-played boat.
Agree with posters saying small flop bet from us here. Say 25-30.
If villains have absolutely nothing (say 9d8d ish) we're never extracting any more $ here. Our bet looks stabbing at the pot/weak and bad villains might try to steal pot here. Any other ace or queen holding will come along, maybe re-raise.
Small flop bet gives us a lot of information while still building the pot with a dominating hand. Flop check by us gives any villain with small pair (very small) chance of boating up on the turn.
What do people think about a 20-25% pot bet on the flop? Against a fish and an unknown I think I prefer it to trying to force the issue on the turn.
To be clear, I'm happy with advice/questions about any action before the ?? part ... I just disagree with this.
I think this is better against thinking players ... In my experience betting small on AAx flops live at 1-2, almost everybody plays pretty close to transparently (fold everything but Ax and flush draws) sometimes if they think you are cbetting too much they'll call their bigger pairs (or like QT+ in this hand) but they'll be cautious until showdown. But when you check they'll bet way more than 25% on the turn with A2, and will very often keep betting big on the river if you call, so you don't gain much from the small bet. Then there's the 5%+ of the time someone tries a no equity bluff randomly because you checked the flop (I strongly disagree with the assumption that 9d8d never bets if we check). Also I've lost count of the number of times I've seen people loose their minds and shovel money in with Qx when a Q hits the turn (for AAQQ), but would just fold flop to a bet.
Yes, when you then start raising it sets off red flags for people, even at 1-2, but the worse the player the less attention they pay to the flags. Esp. after they've put more money in when they thought they were ahead (the old, "I know I'm beat but I call anyway").
On the other side the better players at 2-5 understand you have a wider range if you down bet here and will bluff raise some draws and/or weaker Ax hands ... they'll also call you down to bluff catch often enough that I would mostly range bet (in a 3bet pot) this flop 3ways for 25% at 2-5.
That's all imperfect information from live experience, and my 1-2 strat. is very exploitable vs. good players ... but I tried betting small for a long time and saw an endless sea of folds while watching other people check and win huge pots often enough against hands that shouldn't be putting money in.
I kind of feel like hungry horse poker telling everyone that you should just 100% bet with air and check Ax, and we'll balance by doing the opposite on completely different boards ... but :shrugs:, I also like money.
Results:
Spoiler
So, yeh, the plan was to call when V1 bet and V2 folded but after V2 called I thought it'd look too strong to just call and there are a few rivers that are bad for me (esp. vs. action from V2) and the pot is going to be so big that it's going to be difficult to bluff rivers for 2/3 pot for V1 but would also suck to think about folding for me ...
So I think for maybe 16 seconds and shove, V1 snap folds, and V2 tanks obviously hating the spot he's in but eventually folds ... V2 talked for a while trying to find out what I had, saying that I "wouldn't" do that with AQ and I might be bluffing JJ (presumably with a ♠) so I assume he had K♠Q♠ or maybe K♠T♠ and wanted to see a river, but who knows.
It's an interesting spot, multi-way. I agree that calling looks strong and the river SPR is going to create awkward spots for you and V1 depending on what V2 does. But shoving also looks strong, and shuts out all the draws, and possibly some stronger hands. My guess is the difference in EV between flatting and jamming is fairly minimal.
I dunno, though. If we flat, we could have some draws in our range, or maybe Qx, and maybe one of our opponents tries to steal the pot with a big bet on a brick river. When we'll be last to act, I think maybe we should lean more towards flatting.
Turn shove is good as played.
Small flop bet would have been fine, but I don't have a problem with you setting a trap (and getting burnt sometimes if someone hits flush or boat)
